"It's been an emotional ride," says Christopher Gattelli who still gets moved when he talks about young people's responses to the Broadway musical "Newsies."

Gattelli, who won a Tony Award for his choreography in the 2012 show, speaks of crowds of young boys at the stage door throughout the Broadway run and of young male dancers who came up to him thanking him for his choreography, saying that they want to dance in the show some day.

And some of them are doing just that as the musical hits the road, opening this week at Waterbury's Palace Theater before its "official" tour premiere next month in Philadelphia. The show, a Broadway booking coup for the Palace, runs Thursday to Saturday, Oct. 23 to 25.

"These new young dancers are carrying the torch now," says Gattelli during a recent break in rehearsals for the tour in Manhattan. "Here we are again in the same rehearsal room where we began putting the show together three years ago. When it came time this time to stage 'the paper dance' [arguably the musical's show-stopping number] the room erupted in cheers and I had to leave the room for a moment to compose myself."

The show, which centers on an 1899 strike by newspaper boys against the powerful publisher Joseph Pulitzer, bursts with kid energy. The boy-centric nature of the show is an anomaly in a Broadway world that seems to always favor the girls with musicals like "Annie, "Matilda," The Secret Garden" and "Little Women." "Billy Elliot" was a recent exception — "and I see this as 20 Billy Elliots on stage," laughs Gattelli.

"Newsies" plays at Waterbury's Palace Theater Oct. 23 to 25.

Say the tour's youngest of the principal dancers, 16-year-old Ben Cook, who was first inspired by the show when he saw it when he was 14: "Coming from Virginia, guy dancers weren't exactly a huge thing so it's great to see a show with all guy dancers who are big and strong and masculine and looking great."

Flop To Cult To Hit

Few would have guessed that a hit musical could be crafted from the1992 Disney musical film that flopped. But the film, which starred a singing and dancing Christian Bale in his pre-sullen days, achieved a cult status with its video and DVD release. This encouraged Disney to create an under-the-radar stage production with a new book by Harvey Fierstein ("La Cage Aux Folles," "Kinky Boots") and an expanded score by eight-time Oscar-winner Alan Menken and lyricist Jack Feldman.

The new stage show was so well-received during its Paper Mill Playhouse run in New Jersey in late 2011 that it transferred to Broadway in early 2012. Tony Award nominee Jeff Calhoun directed, hot young actor Jeremy Jordan starred but it was Gattelli's choreography and the athletic, driven dancers who quickly became the stars of the show.

But what is it about the show that struck such a strong chord among boys? After all, the era of the newspaper boy is long past.

"You're watching a show about kids trying to find their way in the world," says Gattelli, "and who are trying to make a place for themselves at the table. These [anonymous newspaper boys] are kids who work hard, and have integrity, and who just ask for a fair shake in life. But on top of that as a member of the audience you're also watching young Broadway dancers — who have been trained and are working very hard — making it, too."

Upping the Ante

Gattelli says that the popularity of TV shows such as "So You Think You Can Dance," "America's Got Talent" and "Dancing with the Stars" have increased dancing expectations from audiences. "I think [the TV shows] have upped the ante," he says. "People who love dancing will know they'll be seeing phenomenal dancing in our show that they're not going to see anywhere else."

Julian DeGuzman, 27, one of the older of the "Newsies" ensemble and a holdover from the Broadway production, has noticed the changing dance dynamics in the last five to 10 years, too. "The dancing tricks have gotten crazier," says the San Francisco-area native. "Dancers who audition now are now doing full twists and gainers and break dancing movies. There's a lot more different genres in their dance vocabulary, too. There's not a typical musical theater dancer anymore."

Having a cast of young males in their teens and 20s allows Gattelli to push the dancing envelope. "In my head I imagined these dances that I just loved but thought they couldn't be done eight times a week — and these guys just did it."

The challenge in "Newsies," says Jack Sippel, 20, from St. Louis, who is also a "Newsie," "is the sheer athleticism of the show while maintaining the virtuosity of the choreography. It's being able to do a tumbling pass at the beginning of the show and doing it with the same energy at the end. It also calls for incredible focus because someone may be flying over your head at any given moment."

But dancers have to be incredibly versatile now. "You have to do everything: act, sing and dance," Gattelli says. "The performers in "Newsies" are fantastic actors, can hit high Cs and do high kicks. I don't know if I could have done a show like this when I was their age," Gattelli adds though he can still do a double turn: a jump in the air while turning twice from a standing position. "Now the boys are doing triples and I've never seen that before. It makes my heart burst because they're so passionate and they want it so badly. This new generation is so inspiring to me."

Next up for Gattelli is choreographing for a new Broadway-bound musical "Amazing Grace" that is opening this month in Chicago (and which had a workshop at Goodspeed's Norma Terris Theater in Chester several years ago). He's also developing a dance play called "In Your Arms," made up of 10 pieces on the theme of love written by well known playwrights including Terrence McNally, Carrie Fisher, Marsha Norman and Lynn Nottage. Also on tap is a directing-choreography assignment, a do-over of the London stage musical "Top Hat," based on the film featuring the music of Irving Berlin.

Gattelli says his boyhood inspiration was the 1985 film "White Nights" and watching Mikhail Baryshnikov do 23 pirouettes and Gregory Hines tap dancing. He also remembers as a boy seeing the stage musical "Cats," "and seeing this little guy playing Mistoffelees and he's doing all the things that I'm working so hard to do as a dancer. If I can touch boys in that way with 'Newsies,' perhaps they can be the next — who knows?"